Wishes for the last 11 months of 2010

The Christmas cards are nearly all sent and soon it will be Presidents Day, time to take down the tree. It seems a perfect time to mention what I wish for the new year:

 That I’m finally able to turn from I-45 North onto Beltway 8 to the airport without approaching a panic. I’ve made the trip dozens of times, and because of all the exits clustered together there, I get an irrational burst of anxiety, fearing I’ll take the wrong turn. That’s why I usually take 59.

 That I won’t ever have to endure what happened to my colleague Jennie on AirTran last summer. While checking in at the Newport News airport, she chit-chatted with the agent, took her boarding cards and got on her flight to Atlanta. Near the end of the flight, she decided to check to see where her connecting gate for Houston Hobby was. What she saw was startling. Her flight wasn’t for two days. No one had let her know about this important change, resulting from a spate of flight delays

and cancellations. AirTran stuck to its policy of not putting passengers on other

airlines, but because Jennie persisted, she was able to get on a flight to New Orleans the next day after going through the grueling Atlanta airport hotel pickup process. She rented a car for the trip to Houston. Eventually, after more delays, she was reimbursed the $300 for the car rental expense.

 That the policy of charging a fee far beyond the actual cost for using a credit card to buy a plane ticket doesn’t take hold in the United States. That policy is alive and well in Australia, after lawmakers there overhauled credit card laws.

 That I’ll get two denied boardings in one day again. That $800 total in vouchers will come in handy this year.

 The Southwest’s flight attendants keep their sense of humor. I enjoyed it when passengers on a flight about to leave Austin in October were asked to raise their hands if they were too warm. The flight attendant then suggested that while the hands were in the air, passengers should reach a little more and adjust their air flow to help cool the plane.

 That Metro will lower the price of its $15 shuttle from downtown to the airport.

 That airlines will again offer triple elite-qualifying miles, one of the best frequent-flier promotions ever.

 That more travelers will have the urge to be kind, like this one, a good Samaritan who took care of a 79-year-old passenger who was stranded because of the weather. He took her home for a family dinner and put her up in a hotel next to his condo building. “She is somebody’s grandmother,” he said in explaining why he went the extra distance to be sure she was cared for.

 That we’ll all be as alert as Dutch passenger Jasper Schuringa, who sprang into action during the underwear bombing incident over Michigan on Christmas Day.